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Hello! I'm Philip, and I started developing for the web at a startup in NYC in 2007. Fast-forward ten years and here I am in Portland with a decade of experience working on large apps using the best and most popular technologies.
This site you're reading now is made with Rails 5, Bootstrap 4, and PostgreSQL. It's deployed to Microsoft Azure using Docker & Kubernetes, Let's Encrypt, HAProxy, Nginx, and Puma. You can view the source on GitLab.
App development with Rails 2, 3, 4, and 5
Frontend design with HTML 5, CSS 3, and jQuery
DB administration of MySQL & PostgreSQL
git-flow is my preferred branching model
Scaling cloud infrastructure in AWS and Azure, including EC2, RDS, and S3
Production Rails on Phusion Passenger, Apache, Nginx, and Puma
RSpec and minitest TDD
Containerize all the things!
Provisioning infrastructure as code
Ubuntu & CentOS server administration / bash scripting
Image editing and optimization
OAuth API integration with Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn
I started in tech as an analyst at Brightidea back in 2007 when I was 25. At that time, I was transitioning away from mathematics and education. I taught myself Ruby on Rails and was hired a year later at readMedia as their first full-time developer. We grew the company and turned it into what Merit is today.
It was a startup environment, and I didn't just develop in Ruby — I did everything: DB & server administration and deployment, cloud scaling and automation, security, and project management. My passion has always been to build great products with great technologies.
Merit showcases student achievements at hundreds of colleges and universities. Meritpages.com is the largest Rails app I've ever worked on, comprising eight Rails apps deployed in a services architecture on an AWS Ubuntu Linux cluster.
Visit Merit
Go Green Ride is an eco-friendly ridesharing alternative to Uber. GoGreenRide.com and its accompanying iOS and Android apps use a Rails backend that heavily utilizes geolocation services and is deployed on Rackspace using Phusion Passenger.
Visit Go Green Ride
readabout.me was the predecessor to Merit, focusing primarily on students. The Rails app was deployed on Heroku initially, but with its success we quickly outgrew Heroku and switched to AWS.
Visit readabout.me
readMedia sends press releases to newspapers via mail merge for its clients all over the country. I upgraded the readMedia.com Rails 2 app to Rails 3, helped move it onto AWS, and was one of three developers working full-time on the app for many years.
Visit readMedia
Brightidea provides innovation management software-as-a-service. As one of their early employees, I helped with sales, onboarding, consulting, traveling, and running their software.
Visit BrightideaI majored in mathematics in college and grad school, and my first career was as a teacher in New York City. However, I always loved computers and quickly transitioned to my new career as a developer.
I often program for fun, and you can browse my side projects on GitHub. I once wrote a Ruby script to nab myself tickets to The Daily Show, which was first-come-first-serve on its website at the time, and you never knew when tickets would become available.
I majored in mathematics in college and grad school, and my first career was as a teacher in New York City. However, I always loved computers and quickly transitioned to my new career as a developer.
I have two publications: "Reflections in a Euclidean Space," and "Exploration of Reflection Holograms and Their Fringes With a Scanning Electron Microscope."
I attended NYU through Math for America where I took my theoretical knowledge of mathematics and added practical knowledge of teaching.
After getting my Master's degree, I taught 6–8th grade math at the Shuang Wen School (P.S. 184) in Chinatown.
I often program for fun, and you can browse my side projects on GitHub. I once wrote a Ruby script to nab myself tickets to The Daily Show, which was first-come-first-serve on its website at the time, and you never knew when tickets would become available.
Sci-Fi Voter definitively answers the question, "What is the best Star Trek episode?"
Taggy for Evernote was my app in the Mac App Store. Taggy makes your Evernote tags function as you want them to: hierarchically.
Arkanoid is my take on the classic Nintendo Breakout game. Written in C for MS DOS long ago.
I maintain a healthy work/life balance. If you'd like to learn more about me beyond my professional life, check out the links below!
With 1 million views, my Yoshimoto Cube video is my 15 minutes of fame.
Rated 1618 USCF and 2000-ish on Lichess, I'm always looking to improve.
I'm a lifetime member. If we're ever in Boston, I'll take you out on the Charles.
Such a good dog, but he sometimes sits onkjf ssadkl
HHi there! If you've made it this far, drop me a line. I'm always open to remote Ruby on Rails opportunities.I'm looking for a full-time remote Ruby on Rails position. I have 8 years of experience working remotely: I work M-F 9-5 from my home office and I'm always available on Slack or chat, and for pair programming and video calls. I'm also happy to travel onsite on a regular schedule or as needed. Send me an email, let me know what your company is working on, and I'll speak with you soon 👍.
Copyright © 2018 by Philip Brocoum. Icons by Icons8.
